WHITE WASH IN WESTMINSTER

It's exactly the way we suspected it.

The first rule of public inquiries, and one that should be - but never is - a surprise, is that public inquiries, whilst supposedly impartial, never are. There's an old clich� - he who pays the paper calls the tune, and never had this been truer.

Lord Hutton, an esteemed civil servant, was, in no small way, chosen for his conservatism. Presented with the evidence, he would, as would anyone whose commitment to public service and supporting the Civil Service would result in a lifelong dedication, seek always to maintain the intrinsic correctness of the procedures in place, the unchallengable rightness of his beloved Civil Service.

An investigation from within is always a whitewash. Spending your life living inside the bubble of the Civil Service insolates you from the realities of the 'real' world : you become insulated away from what the 'real' world might think.

When I left the Civil Service things which previously had seemed completely normal (and in fact, acting contrary seemed just irregular and plain wrong) were suddenly exposed for the outdated, bureaucratic anarchronisms they were. Viewing life from inside the bubble of the Civil Service distorts and stretches reality - the thin layer of microns separating inside from distorting the light and perverting the vision.

A CYNICAL TIME

It might be cynical to say this, but these are times where people have never been so cynical. Where everything is analysed, deconstructed, viewed not only for what it is, but what it might be. And the Hutton Report is a whitewash. You can't buy a better whitewash : the Government would like to think they've come out of it squeaky clean, but they haven't. No matter how much you try to whitewash the facts, people have memories. They'll remember this time as the time where Tony Blair and his gang bought the truth : they offered Hutton something, something like a knighthood, a cushy consultancy role, the kind of pension they threatened to take off the newly disgraced David Kelly, and he took the bait. Everyone has their price, and yours was pretty cheap.

But that's not what it's about. At stake was more than just this : at stake was the BBC itself. I'm far prouder of the BBC than I am of the current Government. The Government, corrupt liars whose morals know no beginning.

Or the BBC, the impartial, world-renowned, broadcaster unafraid of criticism (of itself, and others), unabashed by the advertising dollar, not chasing corporate sponsorship, one of the few, if not the only, independent broadcaster left. I know which of these two puts the Great into Britain.

If this report harms the BBC, it harms journalists everywhere. From now on, every journalist, every reporter, every TV show, consciously or not, has a decision to make. Do they risk offending the government? Do they risk exposing things that they feel the public should know that the government doesn't want people to know? Will, they too, be found with slashed wrists in woodland after making comments about 'dark actors' and being found in woodlands? Or do they complictly quietly, walk into the future, having handed over their integrity in return for their jobs and pensions? The same way the rest of us do, whenever we too, take employment.

The Whitewash was simple. The Government wanted to discredit the BBC, it wanted to exonerate itself, and he who pays the piper calls the tune. But the Government has achieved a Pyhrric Victory. In a confrontation like this, both sides always lose. The Government has exposed its true colours, that it not-so-secretly seeks to silence criticism, that it rather operate unchallenged, and that the BBC be it's Ministry of Propganda, than the voice of its non-existant conscience.

A QUESTION OF LIES

The real questions still remain. And these are the questions that shall never be answered during this administrations corrupt reign.

Why was the BBC lambasted for not corroborating the word of a world renowned expert on biological weapons, when the Government used, as a key foundation of it's intelligence, the word of just one anonymous informant in Iraq?

Why, when the BBC was lambasted for disseminating misinformation, was the Government not lambasted for the same crime?

Why, when the BBC quoted David Kelly, was it lambasted when his information discredited the governments conclusions, yet the Government was not lambasted for quoting him when his information supported the Government's conclusions?

Why did the Government justify starting a war against Iraq when its leading biological weapons expert said that he thought Iraq had a 30% chance of having such weapons? Or, more accurately, when their leading expert Dr. Kelly said there was a 70% chance of Iraq NOT having the Weapons Of Mass Destruction at all, let alone being able to mobilise them within 45 minutes?

Why did The Government fail to provide Dr.Kelly with Counsel when faced with the Commons Committee? Why did it threaten to withdraw his pension? Why did it present Dr Kelly with a warning letter just as he was about to face the most important, traumatic meeting of his life that was being recorded for television broadcast?

If the Government is truly as concerned as it appears about the loss of innocent life, then the next step it needs to support, the next step it must support and endorse to recover any of its last shreds of credibility in the eyes of all fair and balanced people is a comprehensive investigation into the war on Iraq. Was it justified? Was it legal? Was it right?

What is the bigger crime, I wonder, the BBC failing to verify it has more than one source when broadcasting a radio programme. or The Government failing to verify it has more than one source when taking the world to war? That's the big question, And anyone with a sense of perspective and common sense will know the answer.

A Governments role is to represent and enforce the will of the people. There is no way that our government can claim to be doing it's job in the face of the biggest ever demonstrations in history. Make no mistake, these demonstrations were our revolution.

There will never be a democracy in Iraq. Only ever a puppet regime. And there is no way that Tony Blair and his cronies can ever bring democracy to Iraq - a country most of them have never even been to - if they can't even democratically represent the will of the people who elected them in their own country. I only pray that democracy still works at the next election, that the people speak, and that we too have our own, equally righteous but less violent Regime Change.